What is the most beautiful or original street name in your city?

[FrAnKs]

I quite like "Rue des Pains bénits" (Blessed Breads) in Québec City.

[kwoldtimer]

Originally Posted by jonny24

I've always thought Garafraxa Street in Fergus was a really cool name.

Isn't that also the name of the township?

[Masoliantekw]

It's hard to chose only one from Québec, the city where I grew up.
I was always fascinated with place and street names as a kid. They sounded like poetry to my ears...

• Rue des Grisons
• Passage de la Résistance
• Rue du Trésor ("treasure" street. I learned as an adult that it refers to the "public treasure", or the equivalent of the ministry of finances.)
• Rue de l'Éperon
• Rue Sous-le-Cap, Rue Sous-le-Fort
• Rue des Vaisseaux-du-Roi
• Côte de la Canoterie, Côte de la Potasse
• Chemin de la Canardière
• Rue des Pains-Bénits

Growing up uptown, in the Latin Quarter, those are the names that come to mind when I think of my childhood. I was in shock when I discovered, as a 7 year-old, that neighbourhoods such as Limoilou had streets named with numbers... Première, Deuxième, Troisième... I found that incredibly boring.

[dleung]

Toronto has the worst ones. Avenue Road. Busy Street. Boulevard Street. Silly portmanteaus like Hurontario or Burnhamthorpe. Depressing ones like Warden Ave. One of these are fake.

[SkahHigh]

Originally Posted by Martin Mtl

In Montreal:

Chemin de la Côte-des-Neiges (= road of the Hill of snow)
Avenue de Chateaubriand (mainly because it’s a very aristocratic name for a quirky, very narrow street lined with century old working-class homes).

I also had De Chateaubriand as one of my favourites!

I live in Villeray and there are some of Montreal's nicest street names IMO. Garnier, De Lanaudière, Foucher, De Normanville, Chambord... Lots of French heritage.

[Laceoflight]

Originally Posted by SkahHigh

I also had De Chateaubriand as one of my favourites!

Honestly, I live in Villeray and there are plenty of beautiful street names. Garnier, De Lanaudière, Foucher, De Normanville, Chambord... Lots of French heritage.

I lived in Villeray as well (for 3 years), and I always loved rue des Écores. It would translate as Escarpments street or something like that. I always found that name pretty evocative and unusual, for a street located in the middle of the island. (Villeray / Rosemont).

[kwoldtimer]

In Kitchener, I always liked the sound of Pattandon Ave (PAT-un-dun in local parlance), a contraction of the names of the wives of the original homebuilders. Not far from it is Heiman St (yes, rhymes with!).

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by Masoliantekw

It's hard to chose only one from Québec, the city where I grew up.
I was always fascinated with place and street names as a kid. They sounded like poetry to my ears...

• Rue des Grisons
• Passage de la Résistance
• Rue du Trésor ("treasure" street. I learned as an adult that it refers to the "public treasure", or the equivalent of the ministry of finances.)
• Rue de l'Éperon
• Rue Sous-le-Cap, Rue Sous-le-Fort
• Rue des Vaisseaux-du-Roi
• Côte de la Canoterie, Côte de la Potasse
• Chemin de la Canardière
• Rue des Pains-Bénits

Growing up uptown, in the Latin Quarter, those are the names that come to mind when I think of my childhood. I was in shock when I discovered, as a 7 year-old, that neighbourhoods such as Limoilou had streets named with numbers... Première, Deuxième, Troisième... I found that incredibly boring.

Rue du Petit-Champlain is good too.

Also, Escalier Casse-Cou (Breakneck Stairs), which is not a street of course but a stairway. But it functions as a pedestrian street and has an official toponym and sign.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by SignalHillHiker

Hill O'Chips is probably the most original. Second is probably "The Boulevard". That's its official and complete name.
.

I like street names like that. Like The Boulevard (St. John's and Westmount, as Le Calmar said), The Strand in London or La Canebière* in Marseille.

Ottawa has a very short street called The Driveway.

Along those lines, Grande-Allée in Quebec City is a nice-sounding street name.

*Totally unrelated to a beer can, BTW.

[kwoldtimer]

Originally Posted by Acajack

I like street names like that. Like The Boulevard (St. John's and Westmount, as Le Calmar said), The Strand in London or La Canebière* in Marseille.

Ottawa has a very short street called The Driveway.

Along those lines, Grande-Allée in Quebec City is a nice-sounding street name.

*Totally unrelated to a beer can, BTW.

Avenue Road and The Esplanade in Toronto.

[FrAnKs]

Originally Posted by Acajack

I like street names like that. Like The Boulevard (St. John's and Westmount, as Le Calmar said), The Strand in London or La Canebière* in Marseille.

Ottawa has a very short street called The Driveway.

Along those lines, Grande-Allée in Quebec City is a nice-sounding street name.

*Totally unrelated to a beer can, BTW.

"Grande-Allée" has always sounded prestigious to me.

[jonny24]

Originally Posted by kwoldtimer

Isn't that also the name of the township?

No idea, it just stuck in my mind when we went to the Highland games there when I was a kid, and again last year when we went there for rugby.

Edit: Yep, East Garafraxa Twp. From wikipedia:

While it is unknown how the name "Garafraxa" came to be, there are a number of theories to its origins:

It is derived from an Indian word meaning "panther country"
Commemorating an old Irish estate or castle
From the Scottish stream, the River Garry
From Gaelic fraoch garbh meaning "rough heath"
From local botany Saxifrage or Sassafras
Old English word gara or gar means either a small triangular piece of land or cloth as in a sail, and the Township could be considered part fracta of the Gore, or Gara

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by kwoldtimer

Avenue Road and The Esplanade in Toronto.

I believe that Ottawa has a Promenade Drive. Which means that in French (Ottawa street names are generally bilingual), its name is "Promenade Promenade".

I think it's in Nepean (west end) and dates back to the pre-bilingual era, so no one probably ever thought of this aspect of things.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by Laceoflight

I lived in Villeray as well (for 3 years), and I always loved rue des Écores. It would translate as Escarpments street or something like that. I always found that name pretty evocative and unusual, for a street located in the middle of the island. (Villeray / Rosemont).

I know the word "écores" exists, but every time I see that name (there is also a Lac des Écores) my brain registers that it's a typo, as there is also the much more common word "écorces" which refers to tree bark.

[Acajack]

Gatineau's best street name is a fairly new one: Boulevard des Allumettières.

It was given to a road that took a long time to complete between the Hull and Aylmer sectors. It's now part of Quebec Highway 148 along a corridor that was to be the westward extension of Autoroute 50, but it was never built to a full freeway standard.

Loosely translated, Allumettières means Match Ladies or Matchstick Ladies. This does not refer to their physique but rather to the job they did in the city's match factories a century ago.

This was dangerous, hard work in more ways than one, and these ladies were pioneers of the female labour movement in Quebec, Canada and North America in more ways than one.

I believe they created one of the first women's labour unions, were one of the first women's unions to strike, and were one of the first unions to be led by a woman.

[Andy6]

Winnipeg's might be some French ones:

rue des Ruines du Monastère
boul de la Seigneurie
boul des Hivernants


Obviously the alphabetical series of Victorian ladies' names downtown [some renamed other things]:

[Charlotte]
Dagmar
Ellen
Frances
Gertie
Harriet
Isabel
Juno
Kate
Lydia
[Margaretta]
[Nena]
Olivia
Pearl

What the A and B were supposed to be I've never ascertained.

[Acajack]

Still with Allumettières, when the road was near completion they had a public consultation on the name, and there was a massive public mobilization in favour of the name "Boulevard Bobino". (I think I may have signed the petition.)

Now for those of you who don't know Bobino, he was this guy:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8IlnfcLbF3E

If you've visited the Canadian Museum of History/Civilization in Hull there is a good chance you've walked by his childhood home, as it's almost across the street (one building over actually). His real name was Guy Sanche.

Had the city chosen Boulevard Bobino, I think we might have won this contest hands down.

It would have been equivalent to have a major road in an Anglo-Canadian city named Mr. Dressup Boulevard or Friendly Giant Boulevard.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by Andy6

Winnipeg's might be some French ones:

rue des Ruines du Monastère
boul de la Seigneurie
boul des Hivernants


Obviously the alphabetical series of Victorian ladies' names downtown [some renamed other things]:

[Charlotte]
Dagmar
Ellen
Frances
Gertie
Harriet
Isabel
Juno
Kate
Lydia
[Margaretta]
[Nena]
Olivia
Pearl

What the A and B were supposed to be I've never ascertained.

Dagmar is a Victorian women's name? I've seen that name on streets before, but never knew that.

I once knew someone who lived on Promenade(?) des Intrépides in Winnipeg. I thought that was a pretty cool name.

IIRC Winnipeg generally uses French style and generics (ie rue) for a lot of its newer French street names?

Ottawa, OTOH, uses both English and French generics for almost all of its street names, with the result that the English ones become the default name, and they end up sounding very awkward like:

Des Épinettes Avenue
Des Conifères Street
De l'Église Street
Des Pères-Blancs Road
Du Clairvaux Gardens

[MonkeyRonin]

Roncesvalles sounds pretty.

Some of the named laneways are fun - like the Milky Way.

[MolsonExport]

Progress Avenue in Scarborough.